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Older men, people who live in densely populated but deprived areas, who are obese and who have chronic kidney disease, are more likely not only to develop serious illness from the new coronavirus, but to catch it in the first place, British researchers reported Friday.
Their detailed look at people who sought coronavirus tests from all over England turned up some surprises. People living in larger households were less likely to test positive, but blacks were disproportionately likely to be diagnosed with the virus, the team reported in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.
The team analyzed data from 587 people with positive results and 3,215 with negative results, collected by physicians across England. They found 18% of people ages 40 to 64 tested positive, compared to 4.6% of children age 17 and younger. Men were somewhat more likely than women to test positive.
And people living in poorer areas were more likely to be infected. “Of 668 people in the most deprived areas, 29.5% tested positive, compared with 7.7% in the least deprived areas,” the researchers wrote.
“People in urban areas were more at risk than those in rural areas. Of 1,816 people tested in urban areas, 26.2% tested positive, while in rural areas 5.6% tested positive,” they wrote.
“It’s important to know which groups in the wider community are most at risk of infection so that we can better understand SARS-CoV-2 transmission and how to prevent new cases,” de Lusignan said in a statement.
One surprise: Smokers were less likely to test positive. The researchers don’t think smoking protects people from infection, however.
“Smokers are more likely to have a cough, meaning they might also be more likely to be tested for SARS-CoV-2 than non-smokers, even if they are SARS-CoV-2 negative,” they wrote. “ This more frequent testing could increase the proportion of smokers with negative SARS-CoV-2 results in our sample, which would bias our results. However, the proportion of smokers in our study was low.”
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Italy’s worst-hit coronavirus hotspot, Lombardy, will begin the process of reopening shops, restaurants and hair salons on Monday, the region’s governor said Friday.
According to government data, the northern Italian region has so far recorded the highest number of coronavirus cases across the country. At least 34,242 active cases were reported Friday.
The announcement comes after a meeting between Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, Minister of Regional Affairs Francesco Boccia and Italy’s regional governors, in which the politicians agreed to allow local authorities to ease national confinement measures.
In a statement to CNN, Boccia affirmed that regional authorities will have the freedom to decide whether they wish to begin the process of reopening, or if they will continue to impose confinement measures.
If regional leaders decide to relax additional restrictive measures, they will be required to communicate their actions to the central government, Boccia added.
Saudi Arabia has announced 2,307 new coronavirus cases in the past day — its highest daily increase yet, the country’s health ministry tweeted Friday.
At least nine new deaths related to the virus were also confirmed, bringing the death toll to at least 292, the ministry said.
The additional cases bring the total number of known Covid-19 infections in the country to more than 49,000.
Saudi Arabia on Tuesday announced a new 24-hour nationwide curfew starting May 23 and during Eid holidays to control the spread of the virus, state-news agency SPA reported, quoting the Ministry of Interior.
The kingdom had last month eased lockdown measures during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which started from April 23. The important Eid holidays mark the end of Ramadan.
With ramped up testing, reported coronavirus cases continue to rise in Saudi Arabia, and the authorities have called on residents to limit gatherings, an important custom during Ramadan and Eid holidays.
As part of the de-escalation process in Spain, 70% of the population will now have fewer restrictions under phase one.
The other 30% of the population — mainly in and around Spain’s two largest cities of Madrid and Barcelona — remain on phase zero, but with some relief measures, Health Minister Salvador Illa said during a televised news conference on Friday.
Before the latest changes, just over half of Spain’s population already was on phase one starting May 11.
Illa and the director for Health Emergencies Dr. Fernando Simón explained that Madrid’s region, which includes the Spanish capital and surrounding cities, will remain at phase zero as a precaution despite improvements in reducing coronavirus cases, and quickly detecting new ones.
Italian museums are preparing to reopen on Monday, but the world-renowned Uffizi Gallery in Florence will “probably” wait another week because the government has not issued safety guidelines, the museum’s press office told CNN on Friday.
Uffizi is planning to allow a maximum of 450 people at one time once it reopens, compared to the capacity of 900 before the pandemic, the press office said, adding that the museum has suffered a loss of 10 million euros (about $10.8 million USD) during the lockdown, mainly due lack of revenue from ticket sales, but also from the missed sales of merchandising and books in their shops.
In 2019, the Uffizi was visited by 2.2 million people, the press office said.
The archaeological site of Pompeii is planning to reopen on May 26 with a two-week trial during which visitors will be allowed only on the main streets of the ancient city.
After that period, some of the main “domus” – roman houses – will be opened, with separate entrance and exit paths for visitors.
The Vatican Museums have not set a date for reopening yet.
There are now 4,508,435 cases of coronavirus in the world as of Friday afternoon, according to Johns Hopkins University.
The countries with the highest cases in order are the US, Russia, UK, Spain and Italy.
The US, UK and Italy have the most deaths.
The number of hospitalized coronavirus patients in France has fallen below 20,000 — now totaling at least 19,861, according to the latest figures released by the National Health Agency.
As of today, a total of approximately 27,529 coronavirus patients in France have died — an increase of 104 deaths over the last 24 hours — including at least 17,342 in hospitals and 10,187 in care homes.
Approximately 2,203 coronavirus patients are currently in intensive care, the National Health Agency added.
All care home residents and staff in England — both those with coronavirus symptoms and those without — will be tested between now and early June, UK Health Minister Matt Hancock said on Friday.
More than 25% of care home deaths were caused by coronavirus in England and Wales, data from UK’s Office for National Statistics published on Friday shows.
Hancock defended the government’s strategy in handling the outbreak among the elderly population in residential facilities, saying that this week 600 million euros ($727 million) was made available to care homes in England, on top of the 3.2 billion euros ($3.9 billion) made available in March and April.
He added that these measures helped save lives, and ensured that almost two thirds of care home did not have any cases of coronavirus at all.
A newly identified condition called multi-system inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) is “a bit of a confused picture” right now, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, the World Health Organization (WHO) technical lead on Covid-19, said Friday.
Van Kerkhove said WHO has put out a case definition, describing what symptoms may look like.
“We need to have clinicians use this case definition to determine how many children fit that definition, and then we need specific data collected from each of those patients,” she said at a news briefing.
It’s not clear if the syndrome is what’s called a post-viral syndrome, or a direct result of infection, said Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of WHO’s Health Emergencies Program.
“What we don’t know yet is whether those rare things that happen are associated directly with the virus — and the virus directly attacking the cells and those organs — or is what we are seeing also the result of the immune response to the virus?” he said.
Ryan likened this to what happens with the Ebola virus and bleeding: “It’s not the virus that causes the bleeding. it’s very often the immune response to the presence of the virus that depletes the capacity of the blood to clot. So when a person bleeds, the bleeding continues,” Ryan said.
Ryan also said as the number of global coronavirus cases grows, “you start to potentially notice much more rarer syndromes.”
Coronavirus models that predict the rise and fall of infections help countries plan ahead and prepare, Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, the World Health Organization (WHO) technical lead on Covid-19, said Friday.
Van Kerkhove said the estimates help “get countries ready for how to build the workforce: how many contract tracers do we need, how many clinicians and nurses and medical professionals do we need, how many beds do we need in particular ICU or oxygen support, ventilatory support, treatment centers, et cetera?”
Models work best when they help countries and communities prevent their forecasts from coming to fruition.
“We also know that there are tools that we have that could prevent these numbers from becoming realities,” she said.
The Republic of Ireland will begin to relax its restrictions on Monday, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar confirmed today in a statement, outlining a roadmap for the gradual easing of emergency coronavirus restrictions over the weeks and months ahead.
“I can confirm that it is safe to proceed with Phase 1 of our plan to ease the COVID-19 restrictions on Monday,” Varadkar said.
“If all goes well, we will enter a new phase of reopening our country every three weeks,” he added, confirming that the next government review will take place on June 5.
As part of the government’s new guidance, citizens are urged to continue to stay at home, but will be permitted to meet friends or family outdoors in groups of no more than four, go to work if they are unable to work from home and exercise outside within 5 kilometers of home.
Citizens will also be asked to wear face coverings when using busy public transport services or when in enclosed public areas, such as shops.
Addressing the nation after a meeting of the Irish Cabinet and talks with the First Minister of Northern Ireland, the Irish Prime Minister cautioned that all adjustments are “provisional and reversible,” and are dependent on continued adherence to social distancing measures.
The World Health Organization will release a report later today about the multi-system inflammatory syndrome in children that may be related to the novel coronavirus, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a media briefing in Geneva today.
Tedros also called for all clinicians worldwide to be “on the alert” for this possible coronavirus-related syndrome in children.
The CDC also issued a health alert about the syndrome yesterday. The CDC said children with fever and dysfunction in at least two organ systems, such as the heart, lungs or kidneys, should be considered as possible cases.
“There is limited information currently available about risk factors, pathogenesis, clinical course, and treatment for MIS-C. CDC is requesting healthcare providers report suspected cases to public health authorities to better characterize this newly recognized condition in the pediatric population,” the CDC said in a Health Alert Network advisory to doctors.
Denmark has recorded zero deaths from coronavirus in the past 24 hours, the Danish Ministry of Health’s press office told CNN, adding that this is the first day since March 13 that the country has recorded no fatalities from the virus.
Denmark switched to a mitigation strategy on March 12 and accelerated testing according to an epidemiology report from the Statens Serum Institut in Denmark, which works under the auspices of the Danish Ministry of Health to ensure preparedness against infectious diseases and biological threats.
As of April 1, extensive testing was carried out on patients with mild symptoms, the report adds.
Travel restrictions will be maintained in Norway until August 20, Prime Minister Erna Solberg said during a news conference on Friday.
Solberg advised Norwegians to “plan their summer holidays in Norway.”
She said citizens can travel as long as it is in a way that “avoids spreading the infection.”
“This means that you should not travel when you are sick or quarantining at home, that you should maintain good hygiene and keep at least one meter in distance from others, other than your [own] immediate relatives. The new advice applies from today,” Solberg added in the statement.
According to Norwegian government advice published on Friday, grandparents will be able to go on holiday with their family, “even if they are in a high risk group” and as long as they are “extra mindful of the general infection control measures,” the statement said.
A 9-year-old boy has died from a rare condition possibly linked to coronavirus, a spokesperson for the Timone Marseille hospital in the south of France told CNN on Friday.
The child had tested positive for coronavirus, but he did not develop symptoms, the spokesperson added.
He was hospitalized for seven days after suffering cardiac arrest and subsequently died of a “neurological injury” as a result of the cardiac arrest on Saturday.
French authorities are “aware of a rare disease resembling Kawasaki disease, with symptoms consisting of inflammation, swollen limbs, skin rashes, and most seriously a heart attack, “ the Director of the National Health Agency Jérôme Salomon said last month.
A spokesperson for the national health agency told CNN today that “135 children have developed this disease since the beginning of the pandemic.”
This is the first known fatality in France.
While this disease resembles Kawasaki disease, the French health agency is calling the disease “Kawasaki-like,” according to a national health agency spokeswoman.
“Kawasaki disease is usually found in children under 5 years-old, while the disease we are observing now targets children from 5 to 15 years-old,” she said.
Pakistan’s civil aviation ministry announced that it will allow limited domestic flights to operate from May 16, after a two-month long suspension.
The country’s international flights will remain suspended through Sunday May 31.
Social distancing measures will apply on the domestic flights. Aircraft will be disinfected prior to boarding, at least one vacant seat will be left between passengers and wearing masks will be compulsory, the ministry said in a press release.
Pakistan started a phased reopening of the country on May 9.
There are 37,218 coronavirus cases in the country, with 803 people dead, according to Pakistan’s health ministry.
At least 153 confirmed cases of Covid-19 have been linked to the Itaewon nightclub cluster in the South Korean capital of Seoul, according to the country’s Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (KCDC).
So far, about 46,000 tests have been conducted in relation to the cluster in the Itaewon district, KCDC Director Jung Eun-kyeong said Friday. An estimated 5,500 people visited the five affected nightclubs and around 4,300 of those have been tested.
Some of the clubs are frequented by members of South Korea’s gay community, a detail which has led to an outpouring of hate speech towards the country’s already-embattled LGBTQ population.
Germany will ease quarantine restrictions for incoming travelers from the EU, the Schengen passport-free zone and the UK, the country’s interior ministry announced at a Friday press briefing.
Ministry spokesperson Björn Grünewälder said Germany would only ask travelers to go into quarantine if they arrive from countries with elevated numbers of infections.
A two-week mandatory quarantine still applies to arriving visitors from countries outside the EU.
Interior minister Horst Seehofer announced earlier this week that Germany had “set the clear goal of free travel in Europe by mid-June” and would start easing border controls this week.
The country’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has also raised the topic of travel restrictions, calling for a dialogue with his European counterparts to discuss how the limits can be eased for popular holiday destinations.
Germany’s foreign ministry has invited representatives from Spain, Italy, Austria, Greece, Croatia, Portugal, Malta, Slovenia, Cyprus and Bulgaria to a video conference on the topic on Monday. The goal of the meeting is to coordinate the opening of borders for tourists.
But Maas has already warned that travelers cannot expect to take holidays as normal this summer.
Germany has extended its worldwide global travel warning until at least June 14.
